You Make Me Feel Like I Am Home Again
by tbazzsnow
Summary: Leavers Ball fic. Simon and Baz at Watford for Baz's last night. What happens after their dance at the ball. Conversations, late night snacks, pilgrimages around Watford and a return to Mummer's House. Soft moments, much needed conversations and flustered Baz. Glorious and brilliant art by the inimitable @vkelleyart with great thanks for her support and enthusiasm for this fic.


You Make Me Feel Like I am Home Again

 **Baz**

"Sandwiches," I repeat back to Simon. I can't keep from grinning. That is the most Simon Snow thing he's said in weeks.

I grab his face in my hands and kiss him soundly. I don't care who's watching—they can sod off. This is the best thing that's happened at this dismal excuse for a leavers' ball. Other than Simon showing up in the first place.

Snow wants sandwiches. It's bloody perfect. "Your wish is my command." I slide my hand down Snow's arm to twine our fingers together. "Let's get out of here."

I pull Snow by the hand, passing by Keris and Trixie, Dev and Niall, and all the others who are staring at us.

Let them stare.

I love words. Languages. Etymology. Latin. Greek. French. Sanskrit.

But there are no better words in any language than " _Simon Snow is my boyfriend_ " and I don't care who knows it.

I tug Snow down the corridor. The kitchen is deserted, which surprises me. I suppose the staff will clean up the leavers' ball mess tomorrow.

"Sit." I push Snow onto one of the stools along the wall. "I'll make you a sandwich."

The bewildered look on his face is so endearing that I lean down to press a kiss to his forehead before I go plunder Cook Pritchard's refrigerator.

I get a few roast beef sandwiches plated and fill a pitcher with milk.

"Let's go." I hand the pitcher to Snow. I've got glasses in our room.

It's still our room. Even if he hasn't been there at all this term. To me it will always be _our room_.

Snow stays seated, holding the pitcher. "Where are we going?"

"Our room. Come along."

He doesn't move. "It's not really our room anymore, is it?"

I raise an eyebrow at him and attempt a sneer. "Snow. It is still our room. At least until next term when the lucky sods who score Mummer's tower move in. Now, come on. I thought you were hungry."

He follows me but he's got that blank expression again.

 **Simon**

I follow Baz out of the kitchen. There're so many thoughts whirling through my head that my mind's just kind of shut down.

Shut down to everything except the image of Baz, in his posh suit, making sandwiches for me. _Baz made sandwiches for me_.

Just your typical teenage vampire whipping up a snack for his famished boyfriend.

It just wrecks me every time he does something like this. Something so tender, so effortlessly _kind_.

Things could have been so different if I hadn't been so bloody oblivious. If he hadn't been so bloody defensive.

I can't think about that. I can't think about what Watford might've been like with Baz as my friend all those years. Baz at my side. Baz as my boyfriend.

Baz and me, in our room, as something more than adversaries.

I can't think about that.

 **Baz**

Maybe it's a bad idea to go up to our room. Maybe it's still too soon, too raw for Simon.

We go outside and start walking in the direction of Mummer's House when I get an idea. The night is warm, a slight breeze rustling the leaves, bright stars overhead—a waning moon and no clouds.

All right then. Let's do something different. I veer away from Mummer's and head to the football pitch.

"Where're you going?" Snow asks again. "I thought we were going to the room."

 _The room_. Not _our_ room.

"It too nice a night to be indoors." I'm headed to that tree, the one Snow always used to sit under when he would trail me to practices.

I drop down onto the grass and deposit the plate of sandwiches next to me. Snow stays standing, brow furrowed.

"You'll get grass stains on your suit."

"I'm not fussed about it. Come on. Sit down and eat. I can't believe I actually prepared food for you, Snow, and you're disdaining it."

"Could be poisoned," he mutters, as he gingerly sits down next to me. I know he's joking. He's got a bit of a smile on his face.

I push the plate towards him and lean back against the tree.

It doesn't take long for Snow to demolish the pile of sandwiches. He's as atrocious as ever; big bites, loud chewing, taking swigs of milk directly from the pitcher. I can't take my eyes off him.

"Aren't you going to have some?" Snow points at the one sandwich remaining on the plate. His mouth is full of food so his words are garbled. He's still fucking gorgeous.

I shake my head.

Snow doesn't take the hint. He picks the sandwich up and tries to hand it to me. I shake my head again and he gets that stubborn look I adore and scoots closer to me, gesturing for me to take it from him. "Come on, Baz. I've seen you eat before. Just take it."

I'm weak. I've already humiliated myself by making him a plate of sandwiches. There is no end to the indignities tonight it seems.

I turn my head away from him as I bite into it. It's not half bad, although I probably should have sliced the roast beef thinner.

Snow is just grinning at me. I hate eating in front of people in general, but particularly when they are staring at me. Mordelia used to do it when she was younger; that's why Daphne started sending trays to my room.

Snow's worse. He looks delighted and keeps moving around so he can see my face better. It's maddening.

"Would you stop?"

"Stop what?"

"Stop staring at me. It's unnerving." I turn my head in the other direction, the sandwich remnant in my hand.

He just widens his grin, the insufferable muppet.

"Thought you liked it when I looked at you."

I can feel my face grow hot. I fed earlier, before I visited Mother in the Catacombs. At least the darkness keeps him from seeing how flushed I am.

He's right, of course. I love it when he looks at me. I get this twisting feeling in my stomach when he stares at me—it makes me warm and jittery and desperate to touch him.

I'm so fucking weak for him. "I do like it," I whisper.

"Good." Snow sits up straighter and nods at me. "Finish your sandwich."

I eat the rest of it and then I am forced to wash it down with some milk that I drink directly from the pitcher. Barbaric. Only Snow could induce me to be so uncivilized.

He laughs when I do it, so it's worth the mortification. There's nothing I love more than Simon's laugh.

He stands up and reaches out a hand. "Come on then."

We bicker over what to do with the dishes as we walk. I want to magic them back with an " _ **everything in its place**_ " but Snow objects to the unsanitary aspect of that, which is rich, coming from him. Perhaps living with Bunce has finally cured him of thinking " _ **clean as a whistle**_ " is good for everything. I've been haranguing him about the unsanitary nature of whistles for years. Saliva, germs and whatnot.

We end up just taking the dishes back to the kitchen. Snow does the washing up by hand—he's got no intention of leaving them for Cook Pritchard.

By the time we step out to the courtyard again the music has stopped. The funereal leavers' ball must finally be over.

"I should text Penny," Snow says, pulling his mobile out of his pocket.

I bought it for him before I came back for the spring term. Professor Bunce had lifted the restrictions on electronics and I wanted a better way to reach him than having to call him on the Bunce's home phone.

Being able to text him every day makes it slightly more bearable to be apart.

Fuck it. It doesn't make it any more bearable but it's better than not being able to contact him at all.

"Bunce knows you're here. What do you have to text her about?"

"When to pick me up. I don't want her to have to stay up too late."

"What do you mean ' _pick you up'_?" I hadn't thought about him leaving. It hadn't even crossed my mind that he wouldn't stay, now that he was here.

"Pick me up. Take me back to her place."

"I thought you would stay." The words leave my mouth and I am overcome by a wave of shame. I sound so pathetic.

Snow takes a step closer to me. "Do you want me to?"

Bloody wanker. He's going to make me ask. Fucking hell.

But I do it, because I love him. I've missed him. Missed him so much. Missed his stupid blue eyes, his bronze curls, the way he shrugs at me, the sound of his breathing at night.

I miss that the most, I think. The hushed assurance that he is close to me.

It took me weeks to be able to sleep, when I came back. I tried to rationalize it—maybe I was becoming nocturnal. Was it a vampire thing? But I was sleepy, spent, utterly exhausted when I fell into bed but I still couldn't sleep.

It made me edgy. I'd snapped at Neill and Dev at breakfast more than once.

It did eventually get better. Miss Posibelf finally cornered me to ask why I was yawning in her class so much. She gave me a spell to use—an American one, of all things. " _ **Early to bed, early to rise**_." I had to use it sparingly; it woke me up much too early most mornings.

But it worked. It let me sleep, if just for a little bit, without the aching loss of Snow's presence.

"I didn't think you'd come tonight. But you're here and I can't just let you leave, Simon. I can't face my last night in Mummer's without you, not now that you're here." It's really a tragedy how needy I sound.

I can't help it. I don't want him to go.

Snow's smile widens as he listens to me ask him to stay. I can't keep the bloody words from spilling out.

"I missed you." I speak so softly that I'm not sure he can hear it. I've closed my eyes—I sound so desperate—I can't look him in the face as I do this. "I missed you so damn much, Simon. It's our room and you weren't here." I can feel his breath. He's moved so close to me that I can feel the heat radiating from him. His warm fingers interlace with my own. "I missed everything about you, you magnificent oaf."

His forehead touches mine and I know his lips are so close but I can't stop talking. I'm babbling. Crowley, what a besotted fool I am. "I missed your stupid rumpled bed, the chaos of the papers on your desk, the hospital smell of the blasted soap you use." My voice cracks but I keep going. "The sound of your breathing in the night."

His lips keep me from humiliating myself any further. They're warm and alive and greedy.

Snow's hands are in my hair, our bodies pressed together and I feel like he still isn't close enough. I wrap my arm around his waist and crush him to me, my other hand sinking into his carefully combed curls. I don't want to come up for air.

Kissing Snow makes time stop, slows it down for every touch, every slide of lips and hands. But when I stop kissing him it seems like only seconds have passed and it's never been long enough.

Snow pulls back to catch his breath eventually and our foreheads press together. "I missed you too, Baz." His fingers are still running through my hair. "I've not washed that jumper you left 'cos it smells like you. Sleeping on that cot in Penny's room is all right, I guess, but she doesn't breathe like you. I'm glad she's there, for the nightmares, but she's not you, Baz."

"So, stay tonight. Text her that you're spending the night and stay with me, Simon. For our last night at Watford."

He nods but neither of us move. I don't know how much time passes before he takes his phone out again and taps out a message to Bunce. He waits until his phone pings back with her reply and then he shoves it in his pocket and grins up at me. "Come on, then."

But he's not leading me to Mummer's House. I tug on his hand. "Where are we going, Snow?"

"You called me Simon before."

I roll my eyes. "Where are we going, Simon? I thought we were going back to our room."

"Something I want to do first." He keeps pulling me along and I follow. He's back at Watford and he's smiling. I'm not going to interfere with that—it's more than I ever expected.

We end up on the ramparts. The wind is a little brisker up here. The stars are bright and clear and all around us.

Snow leans against the stone and looks out at the grounds. "I wanted to see it from up here again."

"It's too dark to see much." I'm leaning next to him, shoulders brushing. He slips his arm around my waist and drops his head onto my shoulder.

"I know. But I can still see it all in my memory. It's clearer somehow, up here."

I rest my cheek on his bronze curls and look out over the Watford grounds. All the places that remind me of Snow.

Watford had been full of painful memories for me, since the attack in the nursery. Those memories are still there, but Simon's blunted the pain of them in his own indelible way. He's given me memories of Watford that I treasure, moments that might have been bellicose on the surface but were love as far as I was concerned.

I don't know how to tell him that. Tell him how he transformed a place that held such loss and sorrow for me into a place that felt like home again.

I can't tell him. Because everything with the Humdrum and the Mage—the whole catastrophic end to it all—has done the opposite for Simon. It's taken his home and turned it into a place of tragedy and grief.

It's been taken away and I can't help him get it back. Not like he did for me. He's always giving, Simon is, always trying to do his best.

 **Simon**

I can feel him tense up, the muscles of his back going rigid, his shoulders taut. Baz is thinking about something, something he can blame himself for, more likely than not.

I hate it when he does that. It hurts to see him that way. I used to think it was smugness, aloofness. (He does get smug and aloof still but I know why now.)

It's a mask, a shield, a way to externally protect himself while he tears himself down inside. He's so much better than that, if he'd only let himself believe it.

I don't know how he did it—came to Watford with all those awful memories of his mother's murder and his own turning. How he willingly made himself come _here_ , the epicenter of all the shit life had thrown at him, and made himself succeed and thrive here. The strength and self-control it must have taken—it's breathtaking.

I was the one crying into my pillow those early days when by all rights it should have been Baz doing that.

Baz seeing someone else in his mother's office. Seeing someone else in her private rooms, rooms that he grew up in. Someone denigrating her memory.

That's not to say the Mage's reforms were all wrong—not all of them were—even Baz grudgingly admits that. But the Natasha Pitch that Ebb knew, the Natasha Pitch who came through the Veil for Baz, who trusted a stranger with likely her last words to her son—she's not the woman the Mage made her out to be.

The Mage was wrong about her just as I was wrong about him. It's hard thinking about the Mage. I haven't sorted it all out and it makes me anxious and angry when I think about it. So, I try not to.

I understand Baz a bit better, now that the Mage is gone and Watford is so changed for me. I couldn't wait to get back here every autumn—to run through the gates, see the White Chapel, pound up the stairs to my room, try on my new uniform. I loved it all, even Baz, though I didn't realize it then.

But now . . . I knew I had to do this tonight, come to his leavers ball. I couldn't let him be alone for it.

My hands were shaking so hard Penny had to do it all—my tie, my hair, button up my shirt. My stomach was in knots at the thought of coming back here. And I'm eighteen, not eleven, like Baz was when he had to come back for the first time after it happened. I'd lost my mentor, not a parent. I'd lost my magic, not my soul.

I don't really think Baz has lost his soul. I think that's rubbish and I've told him so. He just scoffs. But I know he's wrong. I can _feel_ it.

Now that I'm here I'm glad I came back. Penny was right. I needed to do it—needed to see Watford peaceful and beautiful like it used to be.

I breathe in the night air.

It's better seeing it at night—the edges of it all blurred and blunted.

I rub circles onto Baz's back. I've left him thinking too long and that's never a good idea. It takes a moment or two but his shoulders finally relax and I can feel him leaning into me.

I like it when he does that. I like it a lot. I love all of Baz's sharp edges—the planes of his face, his sharp wit, wry comments, and brilliant, incisive mind—but I treasure the soft side of him. A side only I get to see.

He's looking up at the sky so I look up too. The moon is waning and it makes the stars so bright and clear. Up here on the ramparts they feel close enough to touch.

It makes me think of that night—that first night—when it all really started. When Baz brought the stars into our room and everything changed between us.

I move closer to him and tilt my head up to press a kiss to his jawline. A small sigh escapes him and then he pulls me into his arms. My head is tucked into the hollow between Baz's shoulder and neck and his arms are tight around me.

I have an idea.

I yank him down onto the cold stone. He yelps in protest but sits down next to me anyway. I sit cross-legged, scooting until I'm positioned across from him and reach for his hands. Baz looks puzzled. "Sit, like this."

He mirrors my position and I link our hands, fingers tightly threaded together. "Look up, Baz." His eyes stay on me so I have to repeat myself. "Look up."

I wait until his head is tilted to the sky before I look up myself. His hands squeeze mine and I know he's thinking back on it too. I'm me, so of course I have to say something.

"It's like that night . . ." I start but he interrupts me.

"In our room."

"The night everything changed." I pause before I say the next few words. "For the better."

His head drops and he stares at me. It's dim in the starlight but Baz is stunning even in such low light.

"For the better." I say it again for emphasis. It's true. I've lost my magic, the only home I'd ever known, the only mentor I ever had. But I have Baz now. I've got a new home with the Bunces and soon I'll be in a flat in London with Penny. The Humdrum is gone, the war with the Old Families has been averted. It _is_ better, for all of us. It'll just take a little longer for me.

"Simon."

I don't let him say it. "No, Baz. I mean it. You've said it yourself—it would've ended in flames otherwise. Who knows how many we'd have taken down with us at the end, with neither of us even wanting to do it."

I squeeze his hands again. "It is better. I wouldn't have this, wouldn't have us."

A pained expression flashes across his face. "But you'd still have your magic, Simon."

I shake my head. This is hard to put into words and words are not easy for me in the best of circumstances. But I need to dispel this idea once and for all.

It _hurts_ to not have magic anymore. I feel the ache of its loss every moment. I loved it so much, loved what it meant to me.

But it was so much to handle, too much sometimes. Most times.

I'm not sure I was ever meant to have it—not that much magic, not so intensely. It was never a good fit—I had to fight for control every time.

It only felt stable when I shared it with Baz. I haven't quite figured that out yet. I think it's something to do with how we fit, how we matched, how we belonged together.

It's why I gave him an out earlier tonight. Because now that it's gone we don't really match anymore. We can't share that ever again.

I miss that, even more than the magic itself. I miss feeling my power push into him. I miss sharing it with him, seeing how he could direct it, how he let it flow into him and surge with the control I always lacked. How he was the one person my magic didn't hurt. How it didn't hurt me, when I was with him.

Baz still thinks we match, despite my lack of magic. I'm going to have to trust him on that. He's been thinking about us for a lot longer than I have.

I'll not say this all hasn't messed me up. Well, messed me up _more_ might be a better way to say it. My concentration is shit. I blink out all the time—lose my focus, my words, my train of thought.

My therapist says that's all normal. Late effects of trauma. Processing and coping with loss. All that.

It's been hard on Baz. My silences. When I withdraw into my own thoughts. He's spent nearly every weekend with me and I've been catatonic at worst and morose at best.

But he soldiers on. Baz lets me be silent. He holds my hand, holds me through the sobs and rages and helps me carry on.

So, I'm still a terrible boyfriend. And I've given him an out that he refuses to take, so at least that gives me the opportunity to be a better one.

Baz is still staring at me and I realize he thinks I've blinked out again. Perhaps I have but it's more too many thoughts than blankness this time. All right then. He's being stubborn. He's good at that. I'm terrible with words but I need him to understand. That with all the shit that's happened to me what I have with him is the one good thing to come out of this mess.

The one good thing that keeps me going.

"Baz. It's better because I have you." He keeps staring at me, his face impassive. Typical. He gets that way when he's scared or uncomfortable. I go off when I feel too much. At least I used to. Baz goes all cold and quiet and puts that expressionless mask up. And sneers. (Sometimes.) (Not as much as he used to.)

I keep talking. "We've been through this. The magic's gone because I _chose_ to give it away, to drain it all away. It shouldn't have been mine in the first place. Whatever he did was making me take it, take it from places it belonged. That wasn't right. It would have destroyed the world. Our world. The World of Mages." I swallow, my eyes on him. He's so still. "I love that world. I would have been the reason it was destroyed, Baz. You know I couldn't let that happen. I couldn't live with that. My magic was a small price to pay to have peace. To stop the holes. To end the Humdrum."

It's true. The holes were getting bigger. There was no end to it, not unless I was killed. Being Normal again is better than being dead.

Well, as normal as one can be with wings and a tail, that is.

The Humdrum existed because of me. We both existed because the Mage manipulated and perverted magic and prophecy to fulfill his twisted agenda. I wasn't the Chosen One. I was the one he _created_ , the one he selected to advance his purposes.

The World of Mages was more important than me. More important than my magic. I tell Baz just that.

He grimaces. I tug on his hands. "I have you, Baz. We're both _alive_. There's peace. We're still here—there was a time we both thought that wouldn't be possible. That we had no other option than a final showdown. I call it a good trade-off. In a choice between my magic or both of us being alive and our world at peace—there was never a question of what I would choose."

"Of course there wasn't, you courageous fuck. You absolute self-sacrificing hero. You would choose the fate of the world over your own, wouldn't you?"

My heart thumps at the fond look on his face.

"You'd have done the same. You were here, with me. You came after me, Baz. Put yourself in danger for me. And you used a bloody love spell to do it, you sentimental twat."

Baz throws his head back and laughs. It's the most beautiful sound. The revelation of Baz's laughter has been the biggest surprise for me, I think. I want to hear it all the time, to know he is carefree and happy enough to let himself do it.

"Are we going to spend the night here on the ramparts, Snow? Bit of a romantic cliché, isn't it?"

"I thought you liked the stars and such." I wave my hand around us.

Baz leans closer. "I do. I always have. But the ones that are scattered across your skin are far more fascinating to me, love."

My face heats up. That's another new development. Baz saying things like that to me. It makes me blush every time. It's an eye-opener for sure. He's such a romantic sap and I love it.

It makes Penny retch but I don't care. I love it and I love Baz when he's like that.

I know he's counted every freckle, every mole. He's memorized the scattered patterns they make across my skin. He has his favorites, the sentimental git.

But I love that too. That he knows me so well. That we know each other so well but that each moment brings new discoveries. It's exhilarating.

I lean forward and press my forehead to his, breathing in the intoxicating scent of him. Cedar and bergamot.

There are so many things I love about Baz-his arresting grey eyes, the way his hair falls when he doesn't slick it back, the smooth baritone of his voice, the endearments that just slip out when he holds me, the way he looks in jeans. Merlin and Morgana, he takes my breath away sometimes. Most times.

All the time.

I love Baz. I'm in love with him.

I haven't told him. I'm such shit with words and I wanted to let him have an out, not feel like he had to stay with me because of that.

He didn't take it. I gave him an out tonight and he didn't take it. I love him for that too. I'm not prepared to tell him just yet, not after being so close to letting him go. I know he loves me too—I'm almost sure of it. Penny says he definitely does-you have to be stupidly in love to use " _ **on love's light wings**_ " and Baz used it to reach me.

It should make it easier, knowing that. But I can't quite say it. Not yet.

Soon maybe. Can't keep it in for much longer.

Time to get out of my head. I've got my brilliant boyfriend right here in front of me and no time to waste on thinking.

I press a kiss to his forehead and then stand, tugging Baz to his feet. "So much for a night of romantic stargazing."

He laughs as he comes to his feet, graceful and balanced as always, the tosser.

Baz's lips brush over mine. "Romantic stargazing appreciated, Simon."

It's a few moments of starlit snogging before we manage to shuffle down the steps to the courtyard again. Watford is silent all around us. Baz makes for Mummer's House but there is one more thing I need to do tonight.

I stop and he stumbles when I do. "What now, Snow?"

"You called me Simon before."

He huffs at me. "Why are we stopping? Don't tell me you're hungry again."

"I've got one more thing I need to do before we go back to the room, Baz."

"Snow. We've got plenty of time to do the nostalgic tour tomorrow. Spare me anymore starlit pilgrimages tonight. It's late."

"You started it—taking me out to the football pitch."

"And I'm ending it. We've toured the kitchen, the pitch, the ramparts and enjoyed a lovely view of Watford at night. I'd like to get back to the familiar comfort of our room. We can go to the Wavering Wood tomorrow."

"I have one more thing I want to do tonight, Baz. It's not one for us to do tomorrow." I'm insistent on this. I owe it to her.

"Fine, Simon. Lead on."

There's only one place left for me to go and it needs to be with Baz. And I'd rather do it now, at night, when we are assured to be alone.

I pull him in the direction of the White Chapel and I feel him stiffen.

"I don't think this is a good idea, Simon." He's pulling at my arm. "In fact, I think it's a terrible idea."

"It's not what you think." He's sure it's about the Mage. It's not.

He stops and no amount of pulling on my part can make him budge. Blasted stubborn vampire strength. He pulls his hand away and crosses his arms over his chest.

Baz's face is thunderous. "No, Simon. Your therapist would be livid if she knew. Penny would have your hide and don't think I won't tell her if you persist in this idiocy."

"Baz."

"No, Simon."

"Baz."

"I will not indulge in this. It's not healthy. You're not ready to confront that yet."

He's right. I'm not. But that's not where I'm going tonight. I'm not going to the Tower. I'm going to the Catacombs.

"Baz." I take his cold hand in mine again, running my thumb over his knuckles. I know he likes that. He's glaring at me.

"I want to say goodbye to your mother. I owe her that, at the least."

He looks stricken. "My mother?"

I nod. "Your mother. She trusted me when she had no reason to. My mentor, the person I looked up to for so many years, betrayed her, murdered her and _she still trusted me_ with the most important message of her life." I put my hands on either side of his face. "I'd like to pay my respects."

He crushes me in his embrace. I'm not sure if he's crying but his breaths are uneven and his face is hidden from me, buried on my shoulder.

I think he's crying.

 **Baz**

I'm crying.

It's not for the reason Simon thinks. I said what I needed to say to Mother earlier. And I meant it. I'm going to be all right.

My mother loved the sour cherry scones enough to feature them on the list of things she would miss about Watford, in her leavers speech.

Simon used to make lists of the things he loved about Watford. There's no one, except my mother, who loves the scones as much as he does.

My mother is never going to get to know this boy, this boy who loves magic and Watford and sour cherry scones the way she did.

And he's never going to get to know her.

She would have liked Simon. She would have loved him. Like I do.

 **Simon**

It takes a few moments for his breathing to even out. "All right," he whispers. "All right."

We enter the White Chapel and Baz conjures a flame in his hand. I've seen him do it countless times and I know it's safe but it still unsettles me. He's flammable. I hate the sight of flames anywhere near him.

We reach Le Tombeau des Enfants quickly. Baz knows the Catacombs as well as he knows the grounds of his own home—better even because he's trod through the Catacombs almost every night for years.

The path is littered with drained rats. I should tell Professor Bunce that it may be a good idea to adopt some cats or hire a skilled exterminator—the rat population will be horrific once Baz leaves Watford.

But that thought drifts away as we reach our destination. I see the bouquet of flowers immediately. Still fresh, of course. Baz has already been here today.

We stand side by side in front of the plaque. I'm not good with words but I've thought about this. I know what I want to say.

"Headmistress Pitch. I'm sorry I didn't properly introduce myself when we met. I'm Simon Snow, Baz's roommate." I lean forward and touch the plaque. "Thank you for trusting me with your message for Baz. I'm sorry he wasn't there to see you. I'm sorry it was just me."

The next bit is the hard part. "I'm sorry for what happened to you. I'm sorry you can't see how amazing Baz is. How brilliant he is. How much he misses you." I can feel Baz stiffen next to me. I keep going. I know she's not here. But I need to say this. "He did it. He figured it all out. And I'm sure he's told you that."

I step back from the plaque. "Thank you for your trust. I hope I did enough. I'm so sorry you can't be here to see him."

The silence is a bit awkward. I don't know what to say to Baz. I just reach for his hand and he grips mine tightly when I do.

"Thank you, Simon." His head is bowed and his hair falls across his face, hiding his profile from me.

"Should I give you a moment, Baz? I can go up."

He shakes his head. "No, I've said what I need to say to her." He reaches forward and presses his hand against the plaque. "I'll be back," he whispers. "I'll be back."

Our walk to Mummer's House is silent. I'm not sure if I've upset Baz by doing that. Probably. I'm impulsive sometimes. Most times. I really needed to do it but maybe I should have done it by myself, without him.

I'm agitating myself about it as we walk. My stomach is churning and I'm berating myself mercilessly as we go up the stairs to the room.

Baz stops at the door. He takes my face in his hands gently, so tenderly that it stops my whirling thoughts and I look up at him.

Baz has grey eyes but that's not an adequate description of them. Sometimes they're dark and stormy. Sometimes they're flat and lifeless, like wet pavement. Sometimes they're like the sea—blue and green and full of light.

And sometimes they're just like this—silver, bright and intense and fond and just for me.

"Thank you." Baz's thumb skims my cheek softly. "I wish . . . I wish she could have been here. I wish I could have talked to her one more time. But if she had to talk to someone, I'm glad that someone was you, Simon Snow. Because you listened to her. You did what she asked. And you cared." He pulls me close and I can feel his lips in my hair, his breath stirring the strands, the intimacy of it making me tremble in his embrace. I wrap my arms around him.

I don't know how long we stay there, outside the door to the room, just holding each other.

Baz finally steps back and opens the door. He walks in and I follow and it's as if I never left.

His bed is immaculate, as usual, the obsessive wanker. And mine is . . . mine is rumpled, just like it always was. My eyes scan around the room.

There are books scattered all over my desk. My wand is on the nightstand, where I left it when I went haring off to Pitch Manor with the information on Nicodemus. My dirty track bottoms are in a little heap in the corner.

Baz hasn't touched a thing. It's all just like it was when I left. It looks . . . it looks like I could come back in here at any minute.

He's standing just behind me, head down, hands in his pockets. His hair is hanging forward, just the way I like it, but it's not enough to hide his face. Baz's cheeks are flushed and he's avoiding looking at me.

Merlin and Morgana, he's embarrassed.

I thought it would be hard, coming back in here, seeing the room as a stranger. But it's not like that at all. It's like I never left. It's like coming home.

But it's not just the room. It's Baz. It's Baz being here, it's Baz having kept my things just where I left them. It's orderly Baz tolerating a mess for months, because it was _my mess_.

It didn't feel like home when Baz was missing. The room felt wrong, it felt his absence. Or maybe I did. Yeah, I did. I felt his absence like a gaping hole in me. And I know why Baz has left it all like this. I know what he meant earlier when he said he missed me. I know that feeling, I just hadn't figured out what it all meant back then.

I know now. And I know how hard it must have been to be alone in here.

But I know Baz. He'll hate it if I mention it.

So, I just go flop on my bed, like I used to.

The mattress is as lumpy as I remember and it's so much better than the cot at Penny's. I put my feet up and cross my legs.

It makes Baz snort and curl his lip up as he looks at me. "Shoes on the bed again, Snow?"

I kick them off and cross my hands behind my head and make myself comfortable. "Better?"

The fond look is back and he smiles instead of sneering at me. "Much better."

 **Baz**

Snow is lounging on the bed, looking delectable and I am exerting all my energy to keep myself from jumping him.

This is going better than I expected. I thought it would be hard for him, to come back to our room. It was hard for me. It didn't feel right without him.

I'd forgotten that I'd kept his things strewn about, just like he had left them the day he came to Hampshire. I couldn't bring myself to tidy up. If I left his things out it made me feel like Snow might come crashing through the door at any minute: hair in glorious disarray, mud on his shoes, grimy and sweaty and absolutely stunning.

I knew he wouldn't but it felt like he _could_ if I kept things like I found them. It was cold comfort but it was something, some vestige of Snow's presence, that I treasured.

I'd completely blanked about it, when I invited him to spend the night. Mortifying, to have him see it now. I've always complained bitterly about his slovenly habits and here I am, with the room an utter disaster and Snow smirking about it.

I don't care. I don't know if I could have brought myself to clean it up, even if I knew he was coming tonight. Pathetic. I'm so gone for him.

"You going to just stand there or are you going to join me?"

Crowley. I'm not ready for this. Snow grinning at me from his bed, saying words I've fantasized about him saying since fifth year. It's my summer wanking fantasies come to life.

No. No. Can't think about that. Damn it, why did I feed earlier? I can feel my face grow hot and heat runs down my body.

I move to the window, so I don't have to look directly at Snow. I open it. I know he likes it open. We fought about it often enough. But now I'm the one that needs the cool night air. It wafts in and I close my eyes and will myself steady.

"It's probably too narrow for the both of us, yeah?" Snow is still talking and nothing he is saying is making me feel less agitated.

I've not thought this through. Snow and I have never been in our room since things changed between us. We were sharing a room on a truce, sharing a room as we shifted into a form of friendship. But we've never shared this room as boyfriends.

I've visited him at Bunce's almost every weekend but I never spent the night there. The Bunces live close enough to Watford that I could easily make the drive. Their house is so full of people—I didn't fancy sharing a room with Snow and Penny. It was easier to just make day trips, take him out—to shop, to eat, to wander about town holding hands. It didn't really matter what we did, as long as we were together.

It also gave me the chance to buy Snow some proper clothes. Jeans instead of his interminable track bottoms. He looks incredible in jeans.

He looks good right now, laying on his bed in that midnight blue suit, lounging back with a playful smirk on his face.

I've imagined this too many times, it doesn't feel real.

"You're nervous." Snow is the master of stating the obvious. It's excruciating.

"I'm not."

"Yes, you are. You're nervous. You're fidgeting with the window latch."

I drop my arm and savagely jam it into my pocket. "I do not fidget."

"You opened the window."

"So observant of you to notice, Snow."

"You hate having the window open."

I am finding him as annoying as I ever did. He's driving me mad at the moment. I don't know if I should snap at him, snog him or retreat to the bathroom to collect myself.

"I hate a lot of things." I do. I really do. I hate the jumbled mess I am at the moment more than anything else.

"You don't hate me." It's infuriating how smug he sounds.

"I could be convinced. It used to be a habit."

Snow laughs. Crowley, I love the sound of it. I love that I can make him laugh now. That it's me that elicits that joyous sound.

"You opened the window for me, Baz, because you know I like it open. You are the most sentimental twat. I love that about you."

I freeze. My fingers are clenched in my pocket and I can't breathe for a moment.

I love Simon. I've loved him for years. I haven't let myself say it to him, not really. I call him 'love' sometimes. As an endearment. Playfully.

Fuck it. Not playfully. I mean it every time I say it. I call him 'love' but I want to tell him how much I love him. I just don't dare.

I know Snow cares for me. I know he likes to have me around, to hold my hand, to snog me until I'm breathless. But I don't think he loves me. Not like I love him.

To hear him say he loves something, anything about me, is a heady feeling. I'm reeling.

So of course, I retreat to the bathroom.

I stand at the sink, staring at my reflection. I take breaths in and out to steady myself. Simon Snow is back in our room. He's sprawled out on his bed and making suggestive comments. To me.

Aleister Crowley, I'm living a charmed life.

I go through my bedtime routine, to calm myself. Wash my face, brush my teeth, change into my pajamas. My face is back to its usual pallor by the time I'm done.

Snow is still on the bed but he's discarded his suit coat and unbuttoned his shirt. I can see the trail of freckles on his chest. He's still smirking. Snow is infuriating and so very attractive.

"You still take forever in the bathroom."

"Cleanliness is a virtue, Snow. You should try it some time." I want to unbutton his shirt the rest of the way. And kiss my way down his chest. Instead I just stand there staring at him.

"You have a spare pair of those posh pajamas for me, Baz?"

I do. Of course, I do. There is nothing I would like to see more than Snow in my sleepwear again. I grab a pair from my closet and toss them at him. Then I go sit on my bed, trying to look casual.

We've never changed in front of each other in the room. We always used the bathroom or changed when we were alone in here. It was our routine, our unspoken rule. I'd just changed in the bathroom. It's been a habit for eight years.

Snow stands up and proceeds to take his shirt off. The light glances off the muscles of his chest, the scattered constellations of his freckles on full display. It's mesmerizing. I shouldn't be watching him but I can't bring myself to look away.

He knows I'm watching. Snow gives me a slow smile and raises one eyebrow. It's infuriating. He's picked that up from me, just like I've picked up his annoying habit of shrugging. It's maddening.

He's maddening. He's doing this on purpose.

He's turned his back to me now so I get the display of the taut planes of his muscles, the silvery lines of his scars defined against his golden skin.

Penny's magicked his wings away so well I can't see any trace of them.

I expect to be disappointed when Snow puts his pajama top on. But he doesn't do it. He tosses it aside and stays shirtless.

Snow winks at me as he walks to the bathroom and shuts the door.

I collapse back on my bed with a groan.

 **Simon**

I close the bathroom door and lean against it.

I love how easy it is to fluster Baz now. I never knew how to get to him before—he would brush off every comment, every insult—he was a master at deflecting them and leaving me fuming. But now all I have to do is raise an eyebrow or wink or stretch and he's a blushing mess. I love it.

I was teasing him just now, with the pajama thing. But I'm as flustered as he is, I'm just hiding it better.

The way he kept the room untouched—it's left me shaken. It's thrilling and disconcerting. I thought I knew him so well—followed him, trailed after him, obsessed about him day and night. But for all I think I know about Baz there is still so much that he keeps buried, hidden behind that exasperating cool mask of his.

Like how much he really cares about me. It's spelled out in every messy corner of our room.

I'm so glad he's started to drop the mask, around me at least. It's still there at times—cold and forbidding—but usually for other people. It shows up for me, rarely, but I have a better idea how to break through it now. And it lets me know he's nervous or unsettled. Those are the only times it makes an appearance anymore, when we're alone—when he's really rattled.

He's rattled tonight and for once he's not managing to hide it well.

We haven't been alone all that much, not since we were at Pitch Manor. Not like this, not like we are tonight.

Those nights in Baz's room were dreamlike. I think back on them, when everything else just gets to be too much. We put it all aside, for a few hours, and just let ourselves be _us_.

I want that again. I want that a lot.

It's been hard, the last few months. Baz has been amazing. He's come down to the Bunces' almost every weekend. Taken me out. We've had dates—real dates—dinner and films and shopping and just walking around holding hands.

He's never spent the night. It's a madhouse, at Penny's. People are milling about all the time—the Bunces themselves, various friends, other mages who stop by to talk to Headmistress Bunce or go over Professor Bunce's findings, members of the Coven. It's agitating, when you're there. I stay in Penny's room a lot. It's easier that way.

It was always good when Baz would come down on a Saturday or Sunday and take me out. I could tell it was awkward for him at the house. He was still a Watford student and just getting to know the Headmistress—being an uninvited guest at her home so often was obviously out of the ordinary for both of them.

It gave us time alone but I wasn't the most communicative. Not that I'm much good at communicating at my best and I haven't been at my best.

I've been at my worst I think. And Baz dealt with it. Spelled my wings and tail invisible so we could go out. Tolerated the long silences. Comforted me when I couldn't stop the tears. Held me through the breakdowns. And snogged me here and there.

But it hasn't been like it was at his house. Where we could leave the outside world behind us and just focus on what was important. Us. We kissed so much my lips were bruised. I knew the planes of his face, the feel of his hair, the curve of his back, the tautness of his abdomen.

Tonight we can have that again. I've come back to Watford and it didn't destroy me. I still love this place. It's not the same—it's got memories I wish I could forget but it's still the place I called home for eight years. I still feel that warmth, the comfort of it, the affection for it.

And Baz is here. He's just outside this door. In our room. I didn't think it would be _our room_ anymore but he's determined it would be. He's made it stay that way. Made me see it that way again.

I splash water on my face. My reflection stares back at me from the mirror. I'm Simon Snow. Just Simon Snow.

I'm not the Chosen One anymore. But I'm who Baz has chosen. And I'd rather have Baz choose me than be what I was.

I choose him too.

I put on the pajama bottoms and take a deep breath. I want to be ok. I know I can be ok again. It's going to be a long road. But I've got Baz and Penny. And my therapist. And the Bunces. I don't have magic. But the World of Mages is still a part of me. I still love it. I can get through it, I just have to keep believing I can.

I walk out into our room. Baz is sitting on his bed, all sharp angles and taut edges.

"Get up," I tell him.

He frowns at me. "We can't go out like this." He gestures at his pajamas.

"We aren't going anywhere. Just get off your bed for a minute."

"I like my bed. Yours is lumpy."

"How would you know?" His face flushes faintly at my question. It must be hours since he fed. His blushes are less intense than they were earlier.

"It just looks lumpier." Baz won't meet my eyes.

"You slept in my bed!" He must have. He's got that guilty look about him, even though he schools his features rapidly.

"I may perhaps have borrowed a pillow once or twice."

"You told me you had trouble sleeping. I know you tried to sleep in my bed. Just admit it."

"I never slept in it. I may possibly have rested on it briefly. Fitfully. In my stupor after a late night of studying." He's crossed his arms and legs and is still perched on the edge of his bed.

"I'm glad. However fitfully you did it, I'm glad to hear it. I slept with that damn jumper of yours and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Now get off the bed."

Baz gets up, graceful and poised, the git. He stands next to his bed, looking at me curiously. "Why did you have me get off the bed, Snow?"

"You called me Simon before." I move the nightstand to the corner. Then I jostle him aside and push his bed across the room until it's flush against mine. "There. That's better. We've got more room that way."

I take his hand. "Come on, Baz. It's time for us to spend one last night in our room."

 **Baz**

He said our room. The glorious muppet stripped half naked in front of me, pushed our beds together and said _our room._

I let him pull me towards the beds. He flops down on mine and pulls me with him. I end up tangled in the blanket, hovering over Simon's face, our bodies pressed together. I can feel the heat of him.

I lean down and kiss that mole on his neck. I move my way up his jaw, following the line of them to his face. I kiss the one on his cheek that I've loved for years. Simon darts his head up to meet my lips. His eyes are half closed and he's got that soft smile that I love. I tell him I love it.

He pulls me down until our foreheads touch. "I love you, Baz Pitch." It's barely a whisper but I hear it.

I hear it and my heart races. It's moments like this that make me think Simon is right, that I really am alive. That if I truly were dead, or half dead, my heart wouldn't react like this. It wouldn't pound at this accelerated rate just because he touched me, or kissed me or . . .

Simon makes me feel alive.

"I love you, Simon Snow."

His lips meet mine and all other thoughts leave my brain. I'm kissing Simon Snow. I love Simon Snow.

And Simon Snow loves me.

Crowley, I'm living a charmed life.

* * *

Fic Title from The Cure song Lovesong

There is spectacular art by the inimitable at vkelleyart that goes with this fic on my ao3 site and also at my tumblr at carryonsimoncarryonbaz


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